Correspondence and Report from His Majesty's Consul at Boma Respecting the Administration of the Independent State of the Congo [and Further Correspondence]

by Roger Casement

On the sixth count:

Whereas the accused admits that upon his return from the expedition against the Banga, a native Chief was killed in the prison of the police station of Banga by the soldiers of that station;

Whereas he admits that on two occasions, when he was in the company of Jamart, the soldiers came to ask for instructions relating to this prisoner, who was making a disturbance; and he also admits that he was actually present in the prison when the prisoner was killed; whereas, however, he affirms that neither he, nor Jamart, gave any order to the soldiers, and that he went to the prison solely to induce the prisoner to remain quiet;

Whereas all the witnesses interrogated on this point in the course of the preliminary inquiry, and at the hearing of the case, did, in a manner the most precise, and consistent in the most minute details, affirm that the accused twice gave the order to kill; first to Sergeant Tangua, who had come for instructions; and on the second occasion to the same sergeant and to the soldier Rixassi when they returned to get the order confirmed; and that it was the accused himself, who, in the prison, after the sergeant had fired upon the prisoner and missed him, handed the gun to the soldier Rixassi, who killed him;

Whereas the latter detail was also given by the witness Houart, confined in the prison at Boma, when the other witnesses were still in the Upper Congo; and it is, therefore, impossible that it was invented;

Whereas these two circumstances, absolutely established by other evidence as well as that of native witnesses, that the accused was in the prison and that he handed the gun to the man who fired, confirm in the most positive manner the fact that it was he who gave the order to fire, an order which the soldiers who were returning from the expedition, on which they had always looked upon the accused as their Commandant, could not hesitate to execute;

Whereas it is, moreover, amply evident that they certainly would not have killed without instructions, even in the presence of the accused;

On the seventh count:

Whereas the facts cited in the prosecution are established, and admitted by the accused, and constitute breaches of the Regulations as to fire-arms;

On the eighth count: